


blue and white, and black

by renaissance



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M, I'm so sorry, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-23
Updated: 2013-04-23
Packaged: 2017-12-09 07:04:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/771391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/renaissance/pseuds/renaissance
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is so cold.</p>
            </blockquote>





	blue and white, and black

**Author's Note:**

> Ok I know I should have spent the ~45 minutes it took me to put this together working on Before Destruction, but this was a necessary distraction.
> 
> Basically I had an idea yesterday, and decided to make it happen today. And I made myself cry writing this so you should read it and weep with me. Feedback is appreciated!

It’s been so long since he saw her last, and it is so cold. He remembers the snows, he remembers his mouth moving and the words “Winter has come” leaving his lips, but he scarcely remembers anything between. Except for her.

Now all he sees is white. Shades of white, darker white where his foot has left the ground, whiter where the snow coats the trees, closer to grey in the sky above, but dappled with the white of the falling snow. It has been days since he lost his party, days wandering in the snow with nothing but his sword and bedroll for company. He sleeps where he can.

Time passed faster when they were together. Every jest he threw her way, every sullen glare she gave him in response, they made his days bearable. It was she who had brought him back to life when he was at his lowest, and she who had so nearly been his downfall.

He stops by a tree. The shape is scarcely visible amongst all the white, but he presses his face up to it and as soon as he feels the bark against his cheek, he knows he will be safe a while longer. He might have smiled, but his lips would not part.

A part of him is still in the Riverlands, chained hand and foot and forced through a cruel Autumn with Brienne by his side. Cleos has faded from the memory, a mere ghost who occasionally appears to fill a silence with his dull words. Mostly, it is Brienne. It is everything she never said to him filling his mind. Time has made a mess of his recollections, and they are sailing the river one moment, bathing together in Harrenhal the next. And then before he has time to exhale more white air into the world, they are in King’s Landing, and he’s handing her Oathkeeper. The look on her face has kept him warm many a night.

Sometimes he’s not with Brienne, but Cersei. Cersei is almost as transparent as Cleos, just another character written between the lines on his page in the White Book. She is as beautiful as ever, but her eyes are blue. Always blue. He’s not sure if that means his own eyes are blue too, since she was ever his image. He’s not sure if that means he is now half a ghost as well.

His mind wanders but his back stays pressed to the tree. In a heartbeat, he’s back on the road North. He can’t remember who suggested it, but somehow they ended up sharing body heat on the frosty nights, and somehow they ended up sharing more. Words. They spoke to each other, she kept him awake and kept him from drifting as she had always done, held him to the ground so that he would not float away and disappear. He told her everything, everything he had to tell. She became more a part of him than Cersei had ever been. He saw her blue eyes, clear as day among the white.

Somehow they had become separated. It was a still night, no blizzard for once, and he suggested firewood. Foolish! He should have been content to rely on her heat. But he was not thinking properly, and she promised she would keep the spot, pitch their tent as he went in search of any suitable wood.

She smiled at him before he turned his back and told him not to take too long, and somehow that smile was worth more warmth than any firewood. And that was when everything that had happened between them suddenly made sense, as he turned his back on her, the last time he saw her, it became so clear. He knows he loves her, but he never understood quite how pervasive his feelings might be.

He loves her more than he loves himself.

He let the realisation fill his mind as he searched for wood, but it was stupid, he knew at the time it was stupid, everything was covered in snow. It was so white, so cold. He had to get back to Brienne.

And still has not found her. How long could he have been searching? As he sinks further into the ground next to the tree he wonders if it really has been days, or if he has been wandering for minutes and Brienne is just a short walk away.

He wonders if she is looking for him.

Slowly, he pulls himself back to his feet. He does not know how long he has been resting by the tree, but it has been too long. A vague sense of hope insinuates its way back into his mind, and once it has taken root, he cannot push it away. He walks blindly into the white, and somehow he manages to wrench his mouth open, and he screams. He screams her name until his throat is raw and the snowflakes on his teeth make it almost unbearable to move. He screams her name until he seems a figure in the distance.

They are approaching him, and for a moment he is confused but there is no mistaking that figure. She is taller than him, but he had never minded that. Without her height, she would not be Brienne, and then he sees the glint of red in her hand, and his heart almost stops.

_Oathkeeper. She is coming to save me._

He calls her name again and breaks into a run. He is tripping over the smallest obstacles, but every time he manages to come back to his feet, until she is mere seconds away from him. He can see her eyes, that beautiful sapphire blue, standing out amongst the snow. But her clothes are torn and he is almost sure he sees dried blood, and he almost stops – what happened to her? A wolf, he reasons. There would be no-one else out this far North.

He stumbles towards her, and in a heartbeat he realises that there are tears freezing in his eyelashes. He is sobbing her name over and over again, but she does not respond. Her mouth would have frozen closed, as his had done before.

And then they are face to face, those blue eyes staring calmly into his.

For a moment they are back on the road North, just a few weeks ago, and she is warming herself by the last fire they ever had.

“I swear to you,” Jaime says quietly, “when this is done I will make you the Lady of Casterly Rock and you shall never want for warmth again.”

She gives him an odd look, almost a smile, but with more confusion. “You would not,” she says after a short while.

“I would,” he protests. “I will! I swear it on your sword.”

“A woman like me could never...”

“Could never?”

“You would not marry me. I know you too well, Jaime. You are the type to marry for love.”

He does not say anything for a very long time. Eventually, after a pained silence, he finds it in himself to reply.

“I am,” he agrees, “which makes you the perfect candidate.”

They do not speak for the rest of the night, and neither of them mention the conversation after that.

And he is back in the present, staring into her astonishing blue eyes. Her skin is so pale, she almost blends into the background. He can smell the dried blood.

Then time stops, the blizzard stops, the winds stop, the trees are still and there is no-one in the white world except the two of them.

“Brienne,” he says quietly, a sudden understanding hitting him like a sword to his gut, “I loved you.”

There is a momentary pause before the wight that was once Brienne, raising her blackened hands, plunges Oathkeeper through his heart.

Jaime Lannister falls slowly backwards and reaches the snowy ground with a subdued thud, blood red spilling colourfully into the enveloping whiteness as a corpse which once loved him more than she loved herself stares down at him with eyes as blue as sapphires.


End file.
